This weekend will be a feast for sports fans with two grand finals on consecutive days—the AFL on Saturday and the NRL on Sunday. Four teams battling it out to win the main prize and be crowned 2020 champions. Years of hard training, commitment, and sacrifice come down to just one game.

Does the Bible have anything to say about sport? Not exactly, but the apostle Paul does make comparisons between athletes and the Christian life. 

Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize (1 Corinthians 9:24-27). 

To the ancient Greeks, just like the Aussies and Kiwis today, sports was a major part of life. The Olympic Games were held religiously every four years from 776 BC to AD 393 (they started again in 1896). So Paul uses the most popular cultural icon they all knew about to help explain the Christian life, calling on Christians to run the race and and fight for faith with the same commitment and perseverance as the elite athletes.  

Paul exhorts Christians to live intentionally – to run to win (v.24) by means of self-control and discipline (vv.26-27). Why? To get a crown that will last forever (v.25).

But that’s where the comparison with sport ends, because athletes run to win and fight with well-aimed blows for a prize that is only temporary (v.25). Spiritual training, however, has value for this life and the life to come. 

By using these comparisons Paul is not saying that salvation is by works. But spiritual sanctification is such that if we don’t feed (on God’s word) and exercise (wrestle in prayer) ourselves right, we will struggle. 

For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come (1 Timothy 4:8).

The way we live our lives has eternal consequences. How are you running the race?  We all find ourselves off-track or ‘out-of-breath’ at times. But praise God that He helps us to the finishing line! 

“… for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose” (Philippians 2:13).

By J. Manners